Avs coach Tony Granato knows the tough situation his team is in. After the loss at Atlanta on Tuesday night, he was asked if he’s monitoring his players’ “battle level” in tough times. Those who aren’t showing a high level could find themselves in another uniform next season.

“You want to see guys compete from the start of the season through the end, and especially when times get tough,” Granato said. “That’s what you’re looking for. You’re looking for character, for players you want to go to battle with and will battle through tough times. That’s what character is, and that’s what this organization is all about, is winning.”

Is Granato seeing enough of that from his players?

“I’ve seen it the last seven games,” he said. “I’m not going to question guys’ effort level. We’ve got a group of men who compete hard. Sometimes we don’t compete smart, or execute like we need to in certain situations. But they compete and they work.”

What guy answers that call better than Lappy? The guy blocks two shots against Carolina and has to be helped off the ice, only to come back and battle through another 40:00. Then he goes out and does it again against Atlanta.

One thing Foote noticed, after the Avs got down 2-0 in the first couple minutes of Tuesday’s game, was how some teammates seemed to sag mentally. This is something he hopes to change with more veteran wisdom.

“We got behind quick, and gave their guys confidence and took a couple of our guys out of the game,” Foote said. “When that happens, we’re going to have to realize we have to fight back. When we have leads, we’re real strong (18-0-0 after two periods), but we’re not always going to have leads. We just have to stay focused.”

Do you ever see Lappy get down? He’s usually the guy Granato puts out on the ice after a let down to try and get the team going again. Why does Granato continue to start the Lappy line (IBC line)? As stated during the Atlanta game, it’s because Granato wants them to set the tone for the game.

Why, oh why would we ever want to re-sign this guy?

obviously they should resign him, but if detroit’s willing to overpay and send brendan smith or Daniel Larsson then you’d have to listen.

That is one of my favorite pics of Lappy. Isn’t this the celebration that he later commented on saying “I had a little too much butter on my toast”?
I printed this one out, got him to sign it and it is up in my office.

AD better just be trying to drum up hits for his blog post. Up until now I have never said seriously that I would stop watching the avs or suffer any loss in my fandom. But this would be like brunette and may all rolled into one, and that’s a tough pill to swallow. I might have to turn the give-a-shit meter to 0 til FG was gone.

Let me see if I have the straight. First, Dater poses a really stupid question to the fan base: “Should the Avs trade their fan favorite?” Of course people respond, blog traffic goes up (which is necessary now that there is no Forsberg news) and all is well. Then Dater, after seeing the rise in traffic, posts “Lappy to the Wings!”. Dater has joined Eklund and Bruce “Malkin to the Kings” Garrioch this season in being the worst trade crap pushers on the nets.

What’s next? Budaj is headed back to Slovakia?